The Blanket That Saved Me From A Blood Transfusion
Trust your internal voice even when the odds are against you.
Have you been there? In that moment when the doctor declares action is required. The medical staff scurrying about at a frantic pace fetching all the supplies needed for the doc’s declared action.
A heavy pounding heart can be a common reaction when a diagnosis is announced and the doctor says immediate action is required. The temporary condition of anxiety takes on a whole new meaning. The fragility of life is realized in those types of moments.
The choice is what comes next.
Does the action declared have a survival rate to consider? Can there be some other form of treatment? Is it an invasive procedure? Is the diagnosis correct?
Perhaps the idea of a second opinion could have time to be employed. What about a natural healing method? These questions and more can come to mind when one is facing a diagnosed health issue.
Wisdom is to consider all options available for diagnosis and treatment.
When the choice does not appear available and life is threatening to head out to the other realm within minutes what can one do? Is there still a choice? Yes, one could choose to succumb to the inevitable or fight for the life needed to live.
The choice is available whether realized or not. The choice to fight for life or gracefully fade into the ether is not a choice anyone wants to consider. Gratitude for the choice may be the only comfort during that kind of situation.
Choice truly is always available, though it may not be realized in the prison of anxiety, pain, or fear of losing a life.
Medical professionals have their own set of standards and ways of performing solutions.
Trusting their solutions is common in America. Often it seems to be the only option if saving a life is the goal.
Yet my experiences have shown me that trusting an educated medical professional as the only solution is not always wise and never the only choice. Our own education could be what is needed to choose what’s right for ourselves.
Risks are involved when facing choices.
The risk of losing a life is not a risk anyone wants to take. Especially when the doctor is stating a procedure is available that will solve it all.
The risks to the procedure often seem like no risk at all when compared to the risk of attending one’s own funeral or living with chronic pain. Wisdom is to consider those risks as a reality because they are a reality.
A blood transfusion may sound like a common procedure with minimal to no risk involved.
It’s a procedure conducted on a daily basis here in America. Blood banks are located all across our nation in an attempt to collect the precious life liquid needed to sustain life in an emergency.
Many have survived physical trauma and escaped death for that moment simply because of all those thoughtful blood donors out there supplying the precious life liquid we need in our veins.
Common procedures like blood transfusions can be a beautiful thing. Let’s ask, why is it so common? Is it the doctor's first response to trauma? In my experience, it was the first and only solution given by the medical staff.
The idea of a choice was not given.
In fact, the choice was denied when I expressed my refusal of the procedure. The statement,
“ You will die without it”
was told to me by the highly educated medical staff as they scurried about in a rush to grab those bags of precious life liquid.
Why refuse a blood transfusion?
Why the refusal if it is so common a procedure and it’s what the doctor prescribed in order to escape death?
Why would one choose death versus a blood transfusion? Wisdom looks at choices and risks but as a rule, choosing death doesn’t sound wise to anyone. When the doctor says the choice is death or a blood transfusion it’s not hard to guess what most Americans would choose.
I have no death wish. I had just given birth to my second child. He was healthy and beautiful. Life’s journey ahead was full of joy and promise. My body, however, was traumatized by the birthing event.
The nurses could not read a pulse. They said I didn’t have one. The monitoring machines were beeping their loud emergency beeps. My body trembled uncontrollably giving new meaning to the term “shaking like a leaf”. The doctor said,
“Give her a blood transfusion.”
As I laid there naked shaking like a leaf uncontrollably in that hospital bed without a pulse my only thoughts were, give me my baby and give me a blanket. The fight for life was real at that moment.
The medical staff did not see where there was time for a blanket or cuddling a child. Saving my life was the theme for the medical staff in that hospital room that day.
Their first response was what the medical field had taught them.
A blood transfusion would fix everything according to their education and experiences. A stubborn patient with no medical education did not deter them from their mission in any kind of way.
They rushed into the room with those bags of precious life liquid ready to hook me up with the blood of another. Once more my refusal was announced and my quest for comfort was pursued.
Naked and trembling like a paint-mixing machine, I asked again for a blanket. Frustration was high in the hearts of the medical staff. They truly believed my refusal was foolish and that death was inevitable if I did not follow their solution.
Adamantly they continued to coax me into the blood transfusion idea as they agreed to bring me the requested blanket.
The blanket arrived.
It was a heavy heated blanket, warm and soft to touch. It gave me the comfort I had been seeking. The uncontrollable shaking of my body stopped within minutes of receiving that blanket.
A pulse returned readable on their machines. Calmness returned to the atmosphere of the room and my soul as well.
A blood transfusion no longer was needed.
That event turned out nicely. I was able to take my healthy baby home to meet our family the very next day and all that precious life liquid that our nation works so hard to collect was left in reserve for some other trauma inflicted situation.
Many have asked, Why such a fight against an easy solution like a blood transfusion? Why take a risk at death with so much life promised ahead and such an easy solution available?
Wisdom looks at choices and makes one.
Faith is much the same. Wisdom is not the authority I used that day when refusing a blood transfusion. Faith is what I employed. “Faith in what?”, might be the next question asked. Faith in a higher power than the medical staff?
The answer is yes in many ways, yet faith in common sense instead of the common procedure is the theme I used to operate from that day. The blood transfusion was definitely available to me. If the blanket did not provide a solution the extreme measures of a blood transfusion still would have been an available choice. Praise be to God that it was not needed.
I’ve included below a photo of that baby boy and his two little ladies, for your enjoyment.
